


Young and Restless

by Paint_It_Yellow



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! GX
Genre: F/M, Gen, Trans Character, Trans Female Character, because she is y'all just missin, genius rei, there's brief mentions and appearances from daitokuji asuka and hayato, trans rei
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-06-25
Packaged: 2020-05-19 19:16:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19362766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paint_It_Yellow/pseuds/Paint_It_Yellow
Summary: Rei never really fit in- too quiet, too smart for the other kids but always unsure. Life finds its way, though, to get everyone out of their comfort zone and so from a quiet town to a bustling island, eventually she may find herself.





	Young and Restless

Rei was, by the standard of many, an odd child. Odd, but undeniably bright. She could read before she’d met a child her own age and had spoken her first word not too much earlier than that. To her parents it seemed a great deal but it was always just another day for her.

“You’re going to go on to do great things, Rei!” Her mother would say constantly as though caught on a loop while her dad was a bobblehead.

“Maybe we’ll be able to retire early,” her mother would continue on, prompting a laugh from whoever she was saying it to at that particular moment though Rei herself never knew where the humour was in the statement.

It wasn’t until she was four that her parents noticed her distinct lack of social links, friends in the realm of nonexistence- she hadn’t even made any up for herself as far as they knew- so they took matters into their own hands. Smarts don’t do you any good if it can’t be applied to manipulate others or so the saying went, right?

“This is Sasaki’s boy, Koji,” her mother introduced a boy about Rei’s height after she’d spent a significant amount of time just staring at all of the children. “Why don’t you go play with him and his friends?”

Rei nodded mutely while her mother smiled and headed off to talk to some of the other mothers watching before turning her attention to the newly introduced Koji who glowered for a moment.

“Listen!” He demanded, pointing at her so suddenly she hadn’t the chance to flinch and was very nearly clocked in the face. “You’re only playing with us as long as you listen to what I say- I’m only letting you come ‘cause mum said so, you got that?”

Rei nodded, earning a chuffed look from Koji as he marched off towards the sand pit were two other boys were sitting, looking up from what they were doing as they saw the two of them head their way, though she found her eyes latching onto the ground as soon as they spotted her.

“Who’re you?” The question was asked to her but she just sat in silence, shuffling feet and refusing to sit.

The boy turned to Koji for answers as it became clear even to the youth that she wouldn’t respond.

“Some kid with no friends,” he said and while it lacked any sort of mean spirit, Rei felt it hit anyway. “Hey, we’re making a castle, hurry and help!” And with the instruction, she was pulled down to her knees with a resounding ‘thump’.

She watched as sand clung under short nails and stuck to their hands before taking a moment to really take in the structure- the supposed castle. It looked nothing like a castle in all truth, they were everywhere in the books she read from the history books in her dad’s study to the fiction she read at the library, so she thought herself something like an expert.

“Hurry up!” The instruction sounded louder this time, enough for her to flinch before she heard the thumping of uneven footsteps behind her.

“Stop yelling, Koji!” Rei turned around and faced a girl decked out in much brighter, much more distinct colours than any of those currently sitting in the sand pit and, though their hair was all the same colour, even her hair seemed to differ.

“What’s it to you?”

“We’re all trying to play!”

“So are we!”

“Then why are you yelling? Last time I checked ‘playing’ doesn’t include ‘yelling’!” She seemed pretty proud of that retort if the way her eyes shone and chest puffed briefly was any indicator.

“We’re teaching the new kid how to play!”

The girl’s attention shifted to include Rei as though she hadn’t existed before the moment she was mentioned, causing her to flinch at the newfound attention.

“Not very well, clearly! You’re scaring him!”

“Are not!”

“Are too!”

“Are not!”

“Are too!”

Koji huffed, probably coming to the same conclusion as Rei about the end result of their argument. “Fine then, let’s see you do a better job!”

Rei was smart but she hadn’t seen that one coming.

The girl seemed to be up for the challenge though, whether or not she actually wanted to play with Rei was another question entirely though. She grabbed Rei’s wrist and pulled her up and out of the sand pit without much of a chance for an utterance of objection, pulling her along towards the pack of probably only three kids who’d ended up watching the argument unfold, muttering ‘stupid boys’ under her breath.

“Guys, this is, uh…” the girl looked to her, realising she hadn’t gathered a name.

“Rei.”

“Rei. He’ll be playing with us today because the boys being stupid and we have to prove them wrong!” She paused for a moment before turning her attention back to Rei. “Not that you’re stupid. I don’t think.”

“Are you?” One of the girls from the groups asked after a brief pause, seeming a bit shy but apparently not shy enough to not ask a question you’d be hard pushed to find anyone older ask.

It really depended on what the topic was, Rei thought, though she didn’t say that. “My mum and dad say I’m smart.”

That seemed good enough for the moment though as they all turned to introduce themselves, much more enthusiastic at the thought of another to play with than the boys had certainly been.

In the end, their game hadn’t been any more or less interesting than that of the boys’- a game of tig in the form of what they liked to call ‘rescue and capture’. She didn’t call them out on the matter though, they seemed proud to think that they’d come up with it all by themselves.

“One person’s the monster, one person’s the hero and the rest are princesses who’ve been captured- you can be the hero, I guess, since you’re a guy,” the girl who dragged her over explained.

“You said I could be the hero this time though!” One of the three complained, holding back what Rei could only imagine was a glare at her for suddenly intruding and taking away her long-awaited role.

Sakura looked at Rei and then at the girl, strangely conflicted though it seemed like an easy solution to Rei- she was the newcomer after all.

“I can be one of the princesses,” Rei ended up offering before she’d really thought about what she’d said. The word was strange on her tongue, though not wrong.

For all her four years before then she’d never had called herself ‘athletic’ in any way that she understood it but never before had an outdoor activity captured her attention as much as for her to ignore the passage of time, only noticing it by the calling of her mother to call her home, a short walk she found herself the energy left to perform all while she spouted all of that which she’d learned from her day at the park, ignoring the scrapes she’d gained and instead wearing them as though they were trophies of an odd competition by which she was, by no doubt, the winner.

 

* * *

 

It had been a point of contention between her parents as to whether or not she should even go to the local school at first.

“He already knows everything they’re going to teach him!” Her dad had argued, which she agreed with, though she hadn’t a say in it.

“I know, but he deserves a normal childhood at least! We can send him to a more prestigious school when he leaves elementary!”

Of course, that was the more simplified version. Sometimes it would go on for hours and she even recalled one occasion when her parents didn’t talk to each other for almost the entirety of the next day, relaying messages almost exclusively through her. It was extremely odd. Once the debate was settled though, she hadn’t heard mention of it again- not in any place she could get to, at least.

The first day she wore her uniform she couldn’t help the excitement that bubbled in her chest.

“You’ll be such a lady-killer!” her mother announced with a clap of her hands, as though Rei wanted to kill ladies.

Confirming once again that she knew the way on her own and that she didn’t need a guide to show her where to go- she’d be fine on her own, thanks- she found herself on her way to school, kitted out like she always knew she would eventually find herself. It was strange how stiff it felt on her skin, she thought, but had decided it must be one of those things that gets better with time, much like everything else seems to in the books she’d read; things solve themselves for better or worse.

The first day was introductions and people split off. She hadn’t friends from even the park in her class and spent the first day sitting dejectedly alone at her desk. It would get better though, all books started like that. She was just the protagonist, waiting for the event to kick her life into motion.

The day passed, then the next, and the days bled into a week and that week into another in an endless cycle.

She wasn’t always alone, of course. Sometimes she’d play football with the boys, or join in a class-wide game of tig but they were only certain occasions. Only on the rare days there was a class-wide game or one of the boys were off sick and they wanted an extra player. She was destined for more, but maybe not yet. In the meantime, she’d build up her skills- she’d run and climb trees so that when her time came, she’d be ready.

“You shouldn’t climb trees,” she’d be reprimanded constantly, though always get off lightly, “you could fall and hurt yourself!”

But she hadn’t yet, that was the main point.

Sometimes though, her teacher was off. She’d climb a tree and the teacher would tell her off, so she’d climb down and apologise in a half-hearted mumble until they were gone. Then the teacher would come back and she’d be made write a letter of apology, even with all her thought-out reasoning as to why she should be allowed to climb the trees.

Those days, she found herself climbing trees less and less until she stopped altogether- it was one thing writing a letter and another entirely to know your parents are running out of patience and space to put them all. So she’d run alone, or sit and watch the girls as they played one of their many games.

The boys would only play football- sometimes maybe change it up on the odd occasion and start play-fighting, though that was a bit too much for her- and she’d be sat by a grass patch, idly running her fingers through the grass as she watched the girls. She didn’t understand their games of dolls, nor was she really interested, but sometimes they’d play other games. They’d place themselves in a story, sometimes they were spies, sometimes heroes in their own tales; she enjoyed those most.

Whenever she was sitting with only her and the grass, sometimes a well-meaning teacher or older pupil would pop by and crouch by her, expecting her to say something until they noticed her contentedness at just being in that specific area.

“Why do you stroke the grass?” An older pupil asked her once, apparently just as alone as she was.

Rei could only shrug mutely. She just did; a habit, if nothing else.

“One of my friends does something similar,” the upperclassman went on though she wasn’t asked, “though she plays with her hair. When she’s stressed or nervous she’ll untie her hair and stroke it out of its braid on repeat, sometimes until it’s flat.”

Days went by, as per the usual, until she saw the upperclassman again, chatting with a girl with a braid. Ah; so, not here to sit with her. Something about it disappointed her. Mustering all of the courage she had, Rei stood from her usual place and forged her way towards the two girls; one with eyes full of recognition and the other just of polite confusion.

“How do you get a braid?” she asked, pointing at the braided girl’s hair in case she’d gotten the wording wrong.

“You have to grow your hair out super long,” the regular upperclassman replied.

“How do you do that? Mine always stays at this length.” Gently and unknowingly, Rei couldn’t help but run her fingers through the harsh bristles of her shaved hair.

“You just don’t get it cut,” the braided girl stated, head tilting slightly, still confused by the interaction but willing by all means to cooperate in the interaction.

It would be, maybe, correct to say that that had set things off. Every time her father would come to her room to collect her for a haircut she’d run, crashing into many things in her way until her pursuer just gave up.

“Why don’t you want to have your hair cut?” her mum asked after many months had passed.

“I want to bring the grass with me, so I’m never alone.” Naturally, that brought up more questions than answers. “I was told that running your fingers through your hair brings down stress.”

“And who told you this?”

“An upperclassman at my school! I’m looking forward to seeing how correct she is.”

From his place at the dining table, her father suppressed a chuckle, coughing into his hand as though he hadn’t so obviously done so before turning back to his newspaper. Her mother only frowned before kneeling down to Rei’s level.

“Honey, long hair’s for girls- you don’t want to be mistaken for a girl, do you?”

Rei paused for a good moment. It was true that she hadn’t seen any of the boys with long hair, certainly, but she’d seen girls with short hair before- they were stylish, her mother would say as they walked past pictures of models in the windows of shops.

“What’s wrong with girls?” she asked.

“No, no, no!” Her mother attempted to backtrack, “There’s nothing wrong with girls, but they’re different from boys! You don’t want to be seen as something you’re not, do you?”

“How are they different?” How was she different from the girls? Sure enough, sometimes she played with the boys, but many of the girls with their long hair would play more often than she would with them- did they get the same talk?

“They just are.”

That was supposed to be the end of that, Rei guessed as her mother stood up and exited from the kitchen. For a moment, she considered going after her in hopes of an actual answer, but instead she turned towards her father.

“Don’t worry about her,” he said, not even bothering to look down to her, focusing his energy on turning the page of his newspaper. “You’ll understand more when you’re older. Take your time.”

 

* * *

 

In hindsight, she’d heard quite the amount about Duel Monsters. It was a card game that many of the boys in her school played- they went on about it as though it were something revolutionary, though she hadn’t the slightest clue what they were on about and hadn’t the care to look it up. Until now, that would be.

It was odd, then, that she’d found herself completely enraptured by the end of the show. If you asked her beforehand, she would have said it had taken too long but should you have asked her in the moment, she’d have said it hadn’t taken long enough- thirty minutes was all it had taken for her to find herself caring about the card game she’d cared nothing about for years previously.

It was, as the presenters mentioned after the match, a televised duel between two schools- North Academy and Duel Academia. But that’s not what she cared about. One of the duelists had completely stolen her away. A first year, it was mentioned, yet he commanded the stage with his presence. Thinking about he who, to her young self, was most definitely a man of a high caliber, was enough to make her blush like she’d never done so before. She shook her head as she did so, utterly confused by her reaction. It would pass in time, she decided. She’d get over it.

Days passed and she found herself unable to forget that which she saw. That which she previously loathed. The man that was there; Ryo Marufuji- their names even began with the same letter! Most definitely fate, though in which way she wasn’t sure.

Over the years, she’d become more and more detached from her classmates while her hair grew longer and longer, testing the hypothesis to be true as she now had more than just portable grass for she found a strange sense of pride and beauty in her hair as it would glisten in the sun. Sometimes adults would compliment her on it before her mother would shuffle her away awkwardly before much more could be said. The separation between her and her classmates, however, didn’t do well to aid in her search for Duel Monsters.

“I’ll be late home,” she said one morning to her father, the only one at home as her mother was- somewhat thankfully, as recent events would have her think- away on a business trip.

“Why’s that?”

“I’m looking for something,” Rei replied before elaborating, knowing that he’d be searching for more. “A card game shop.”

An amused smile tugged at his lips, though hard to spot through untrained eyes. “I thought you weren’t interested in that sort of thing.”

It had been a while ago now but a few years back his sister had come brandishing a booster pack of Duel Monster cards- ‘my Yujo’s obsessed with them!’- that had been gratefully accepted before being pushed to the far back of a drawer, long forgotten until now.

At the question, Rei felt her face flush and her ever-racing mind halt dramatically, her father watching on in amusement as her tongue went off on nonsense syllables.

“I changed my mind,” she settled for, simple as it was.

“What made you do that?” It was just a genuine curiosity but she felt herself looking for an answer beyond what was there.

“I saw a cool guy on the TV,” she ended up saying, “I can’t get him out of my head. I must really want to beat him.”

Because obviously that’s what it meant. He was a rival, she was just embarrassed to admit it- she’d read it in tons of manga, where two boys become rivals over something like their magic powers. Nevermind that she hadn’t known this guy previously, that was what this was. She’d dedicate herself to beating him! At least establishing herself as his opponent; his rival. Then they’d do rival things, whatever they were.

Slightly apprehensive at the comment, as though the innocent words were surprising, he sat in silence for a moment.

“Alright,” he said, slow as though his brain hadn’t quite caught up to the present, “how about we go together. I’ll pick you up from school today.”

Rei cocked her head ever so slightly to the side. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to spend more time with her dad, it was just that she hadn’t really spent much time with him on the weekdays.

“What about work?” she asked, similar to the way her mother would say ‘he has work’ when she was younger and much more naive than she believed of herself now.

“I’ll make sure to finish up nice and quickly, just for you.”

School went by in a daze though no one seemed to notice- anyone that had maybe just hadn’t thought to mention- and Rei left the school building searching for the black figure that was her father. It didn’t take long to find him; similar but unique among the rest in a way that only made sense in the mind of a child.

“I found a card shop on my way up to school!” Rei bragged as she hopped along, idly listening to her father’s concerns. “So we can go there and find all that we need! I cut out one step of the process.”

As she said as such, she jumped as so she landed in front of a fairly decent-looking, if small, shop with two feet firmly on the ground. She grinned up at her dad who took a glance between the gleaming of her face and the shop before sighing and ruffling her hair, opening the door for her to enter and following soon after.

“Welcome!” A tired voice rang from behind the counter while Rei dove straight to the booster packs, her father watching over her from a distance, seeming confused.

She glanced between the card packs and frowned. It would take a while to complete a good deck with so little cards at a time. Sitting the foil packets back down, she went to sigh as a voice interrupted her.

“Something wrong?” the same drowsy voice from the register, it seemed, belonged to an equally tired looking young woman.

“I want to make a deck but it looks like it might take a while with these…”

The lady smiled loosely. “If you’re just starting you could buy a pre-made deck or a structure deck instead and then build on top of that with the booster packets when you think you’re ready.”

“But I won’t be able to beat my rival with one of those!”

Surprise shimmered in the lady’s eyes for a moment before sleep returned. “If you’re starting from the beginning you’ve got to work your way up. You don’t become immune to poison by taking it all at once.”

Well, Rei supposed that made sense. She didn’t like mackerel until she’d had it several times over the course of many years and she was pretty sure it was poison, even now.

It didn’t even bother her that night when she heard her parents yelling, too engrossed in the cards and books she’d bought to think about much else.

It wasn’t much of a shocker that the thing that finally started to gain Rei friends was Duel Monsters; it’s a communal sport, after all. Can’t play it by yourself. First she started watching as her peers played the game, then they took notice. Some invited, some goaded her to try and play. Sometimes she won, most times she lost. At the beginning.

As the lady foretold, her deck caused her a lot of trouble in the beginning. She didn’t know how to use it properly and even the kids she played against found it predictable with their own shoddily put together decks. She improved rapidly, spending more and more time than she ever could remember with people her own age, playing a game known across the land until soon she found it was the end of the school year once more. To the big leagues, she told herself. She was officially over the halfway mark and into fourth year.

Somehow, she played even more as she made her way through her fourth year, forming a small circle of people she couldn’t quite call friends and was hesitant to call followers for all its connotations. She was aware that they were only gathering around her for her skills; sometimes she’d give them tips or cards she decided she no longer needed.

For all she was known throughout her year though, playing competitively had ran her out. She wanted to, for she’d thought it would be the most lucrative to her goals, but something scared her about them- perhaps all of the older kids dominating even the events held for younger years? She wasn’t all too sure. But now, there was a difference. She was one of the older kids, even if among the younger of the older kids.

A small tournament, she played. She remembered the important parts, but nothing much else. She won- of course she would, her dad had said afterwards as he walked her home, no less for his kid! Though maybe he used different words that she would nowadays repeat no longer. Not in regards to her. The tournament soured her thoughts long, though.

“I play Maiden in Love!” she’d said, like she always would eventually.

“What is he, a girl?” Some of the onlooking children whispered among themselves, mostly boys, speaking as though ‘girl’ was a forbidden word. She didn’t see the issue.

“I thought it was!” she also overheard, playing on autopilot even though she knew she should be playing attention. “I mean, look at his hair.”

Some of the adults hushed them but from the corner of her eyes she could spot it. That look of hidden agreement. She hated it, she decided. It was just hair.

Ever since picking up mention at the tournament, suddenly it was everywhere. No one else acted different, supposedly she just hadn’t noticed before. The next time someone said it, they never said it again. Not in school, anyway.

“My mum says I shouldn’t speak to him anymore,” she overheard a boy that often followed her around say. “She says there’s something wrong with him.”

“Makes sense.” It didn’t but alright. “We only follow him because he’s good at Duel Monsters anyway. He was always weird; didn’t speak to any of us, acted like he was better.”

She threw the first punch at the second of the two speakers but in the end she was still pulled away by a teacher, bleeding. To be fair, all of them were bleeding. From their nose, knees and elbows.

There was no issue in her long hair, she told herself repeatedly. Her destined rival had it- even the creator of Duel Monsters had it! She told herself repeatedly but it crushed.

Apologies were given but not accepted and it didn’t take long for Rei’s quickly accumulated circle to dwindle. Too many people potentially talking behind her back. She didn’t need them anyway; she could handle herself just fine before, so she could do so now.

 

* * *

 

Fifth year was a tumultuous time. Although she was alone just like she’d been, she still found herself drawing attention. After the initial fallout some had tried to fight her; avenging their fallen comrades, they claimed. Some didn’t make a claim, those she decided were either just looking for a fight or were just regular old bullies.

Her mum tried to make claims to the school at first and, to the school’s credit, they did try to do something, she just wasn’t sure what that ‘something’ was. Authority tends to be like that. Even as it kept happening her mum would keep making claims and she kept getting the same response time and time again. Rei decided it was a fruitless endeavour and started to take care of it herself.

She’d still have people fighting her but this time she’d clean herself up before anyone could notice. She sat quietly and hidden away by herself, running theorems of games she’d rarely get to play in her head, until break was over. If all else failed, silence was a good option.

On one particular night in which she went home with scraped knees- blood cleaned off long since- she remembered the dimly lit room her mum sat in, television on but the volume so low it may as well have been off.

“Mum?” she’d asked, standing with bag still on her back.

“What is it? Are you being harassed again?” Always so hasty to snap into action.

She shook her head and her mother’s alertness dimmed as she sank back into her seat. “I think there’s something wrong with me.”

For a moment she thought her mother lost all ability to think for all the silence that settled, heavy, between the two of them as the words left Rei’s lips.

“Why’s that?”

“I don’t know.”

“You know I can’t do much with that, come over here. We can work over it.” She sat forward and dragged a stool forward so that it sat a reasonable distance from her specially for Rei to sit on.

They sat in silence for a long while before Rei finally found herself opening her mouth once more.

“Is it that strange to have long hair?” she asked first, earning a conflicted look. She knew her mother wasn’t too fond of her having such long hair, she’d known since long ago.

“Not at all, plenty of… people have it.” She already knew that, she’d already been told that.

“Then why do they only focus on mine?”

“Maybe they’re just jealous?”

“Maybe?” she uttered under her breath because of course it would be her mother to water the doubt. “They don’t even try. I like having long hair, I don’t see the problem.”

“It’s just boys being boys, they’ll get over it.”

Rei was a boy though, according to her mother. According to her father and her classmates and everyone else. Was she part of the ‘boys being boys’? She didn’t want to be.

“Okay,” she said lamely and went upstairs to toil over the conversation until she fell asleep.

  
“Maybe Rei is a girl!” Was a common phrase she’d heard thrown at her, though this was the first time she’d seen it used at someone else.

“He was a boy when he was younger, though!”

“My older sister’s friend was a girl when he was younger, now he’s a boy.”

“What? That’s weird!”

“No it’s not! My older sister said it’s perfectly normal- she’s in highschool, you know.”

“Dude, a highschooler!”

“C’mon, you can’t argue with that!”

The girl placed her hands on her hips and stuck her tongue out as the small gang of kids ran away with a glare, undeniably proud of herself.

“Is that true?” Rei had always been told to thank people when they helped her but she found the words escape her mouth before she had the chance.

The girl nodded, plopping down to the ground while Rei found herself propping herself up, leaning on the palms of her hands. “My sister says I’m not allowed to say his old name because I’ll be cursed if I do.”

“Is it that easy? To just change genders?” It seemed like a new world she never knew opened up in front of her, new and foggy but undeniably there.

The girl shrugged. “I don’t know, I’m no expert. Why, are you a girl?”

The question almost activated Rei’s fight or flight response but it seemed to be asked by an innocent speaker this time. Part of her wished she’d spoken to this girl earlier; she didn’t even know her name.

“I don’t know. I don’t think my mum would like it if I said I was.”

“What about you though?” The girl asked before asking, “like, do you like wearing dresses and stuff?”

“I’ve never worn a dress.”

“That’s sad. I think you’d look good in one.” Rei could barely restrain the comment inside of her that she was curious herself.

“Why don’t you come over to mine this weekend?” The girl asked.

“What?”

“Mine, this weekend. I’ve plenty of pretty dresses!”

It took a solid few seconds of deliberation before, slowly, Rei found herself nodding her head while the girl stood, dusting herself off and offering a hand out to she who still sat down. Once their hands clasped, the girl smiled, broad and cheeky.

“My name’s Yuri,” she introduced herself. “Nice to meet you!”

That’s the basic run-down of how Rei found herself dragged into a room other than hers, littered with toys of all sorts. The speed at which she was dragged was so different to their previous speed that she was quite honestly surprised she didn’t get whiplash.

“Okay, I actually set out the ones I thought would fit you best beforehand, I was just really excited,” Yuri started, disappearing almost completely into the wardrobe as she dove in to grab their hangers. “You’re pretty much the same height as me so they should fit fine!”

When she emerged Rei found herself looking at three dresses in total: a red long-sleeved dress, a yellow dress embroidered with curls vaguely resembling flowers and a plain white one with thick straps instead of proper sleeves.

“What one first?”

The idea that had been so exciting before now felt so viscerally terrifying and she couldn’t properly understand why- she’d been looking forward to it so much even her parents noticed the way she’d stare into a daze at dinner time, no longer muttering under her breath or planning.

“You, uh… you pick.”

And so she did and Rei found herself getting helped into a yellow dress like one may help a toddler. Before she even saw herself it felt off. Not wrong, per say, but off. It was odd having bare legs, cloth only occasionally brushing up against them, and it felt briefly constraining with the skirt flowing out while her chest was still held tightly. Even weirder, maybe, was feeling the brush of her hair against her arms.  
  
“I was right!” Yuri cheered with the self-assurance of someone who hadn’t found themselves wrong once in their life.

Rei tilted her head, confused.

“I knew you’d be cute- don’t you think so too?”

Taking the plunge, she finally looked in the mirror and found what couldn’t possibly be her. It was most definitely a girl in the mirror, right?

“Is this a trick?” Her hands gripped at the skirt and the girl in the mirror did the same.

“What? No! Hey- wait- don’t cry-”

For all as closed off as Rei tried to be, she decided it would be alright to let in one friend. Just maybe.

 

* * *

 

Planning was hard, executing the plans was harder and she was unsure she could keep up the tale she made.

It wasn’t too long before the school year was to roll off- going into her final year of elementary school- that she found herself storming up to Yuri with reckless abandon, dragging her away from where she had been previously.

“It’s his last year,” she announced, breathing heavily from exertion and panic. “I might never see him.”

Yuri, for her part, seemed to catch up rather quickly as to the situation at hand. “You already know where he goes though, right? Just go see him.”

“I’ve told you this! It’s an elite school! On an island!”

“Then get in.” Rei frowned. “You’re the smart one, I don’t know what you expect me to do here.”

“Help,” Rei requested in a long, drawn-out moan; shaking Yuri lightly as she did so.

Groaning theatrically, Yuri threw in a ‘fine’ and released herself from her friend’s grasp. “Your parents have a computer, right? We can plan at yours but I really am telling you that you’ll be doing most of the work.”

Rei did, in fact, do most of the work. Each day was a day of work, even those without school. She was researching or talking about it, trying to find ways to get everything to work out with as few issues as possible.

“And what are you going to do when you get there?”

“I’m going to duel him and confess my love!” Rei answered enthusiastic voice matched with a dramatic punch to the air even though she’d been asked the question routinely by now for a few weeks. Yuri didn’t really understand but she supported it.

Two months later Rei found herself on a boat to another school while Yuri went on a school trip she was also apparently on.

 

* * *

 

It was surprisingly easy to sneak into Duel Academy as a transfer student; they really just… didn’t check anything. At all. She was greeted at the dock where she was decked out in her cap and Osiris jacket by a young man with black hair and his (or so she assumed) cat.

“Saotome Rei?” Came the question from him and she nodded, trying her best to pay attention to all she could- especially making note of the Professor’s ‘nya’ at the end of his sentence.

“I’ll be in charge of your dorm,” he’d been saying. “There’s a few rowdy kids in there but I’m sure you’ll fit right in.”

As soon as the brown haired kid spoke she knew she wouldn’t have time to fit in- she’d have to focus more on her task than anything else. Of course, she hadn’t been planning on fooling around during her time here, but she did see this place as a goal either way and it’d be nice to know a bit as to what she was getting into.

She hadn’t had time to find him until she spotted him decked out in the same blue as he was in his first year during an assembly with oddly few people. She glanced over, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible considering she was standing at the front of the Osiris', and was interrupted by the light blue-haired boy- Shou, she thought his name was?

“That’s my brother, you know?” he whispered proudly as though he weren’t bluffing to get into her good books. The only thing similar about them was that they had blue hair! “He just got better grades than I did.”

“All right! Who wouldn’t work hard, aiming to be the representative?” Judai, the brown haired one, came from between the two.

“You’re good,” Shou conceded, “but there’s no way Ryo won’t be chosen!”

All right then. She’d give him some credit for at least that. She hadn’t seen Judai duel but she knew the basic dorm structure; he was in red because he sucked. Must be it since he wasn’t a transfer like she was.

The three friends- Hayato, Shou and Judai- were an odd bunch that she hadn’t prepared for which only served to further dart her time up the more she got to know their tendencies.

As such it was almost as soon as they were out of the assembly that she found herself running to the blue dorm. She’d scouted it the day before, anyone who asked she told she was getting used to campus as she was a transfer- not that many people bothered to ask, mind you.

Something about the design of the dorm was off to her, though maybe that was just her seeing that it was a western castle with an over-the-top moat-like river surrounding it sending her mind into overload.

Climbing the tree itself had been pretty easy despite being so out of practice- she’d done it so much as a young kid but had fallen out of the habit as she grew older and older. Look for some of his cards, she told herself, opening the top drawer to the bedside table and finding nothing, only to open the second and find a deck. She doubted it was his main one- a good duelist would keep that on them at all times- but she recognised many of the cards even as she just pulled out the first few.

She smiled as memories of her first time seeing Ryo were brought to mind; that sheer passion he held and the intensity of the match. The thing that got her into Duel Monsters when nothing else could. The thing that had brought her so much pain and so much joy all at once. She touched her cheek to the card only to flush as she realised what she was doing.

“What are you doing?” A recognisable shout came from where she, too, had come. “If you keep that up they’ll think you’re a spy!”

“I’m not!” She spoke, putting the cards back in order and returning to a proper state of mind, turning to face he who had found her. She knew she might get outed but she hoped it wouldn’t be this soon. Would she not get the duel confession she planned for?

“Nevermind, we’ll talk about this later, let’s go!”

Her grip on the deck loosened as she was suddenly pulled by Judai, jerking her head and pulling off the cap, taking the hairpin with it as she went even after all that time she spent each day to tie it up and hide it.

“You’re-” Judai started with a gasp, halting just long enough to give her time to grab her cap and make a break for it.

She couldn’t exactly run off the island but she could run from authority for at least the rest of the day.

So she spent the rest of the day tense, waiting for someone to come and find her. Judai was foolish, that she knew, but he couldn’t quite be that foolish, could he? Afternoon passed as did evening by which she didn’t show up for her meal- the food was awful anyway. Hayato was the first one she saw, but he was just as unmotivated as to her existence as ever. She sat waiting, but no one came. Then, someone did come.

She got to her feet and lowered her stance instinctively before realising it was Judai. Her eyes narrowed and he just looked at her innocently.

“What?”

With the simple word she grabbed him by the wrist and dragged him outside, down to where they’d get hit with cold ocean spray as it stormed up against the rocks.

“Why didn’t you out me this afternoon?” she demanded, almost sounding annoyed that he didn’t.

“Putting in all this effort… dressing as a guy and coming to a place like this. You’ve got your reasons, right?”

She wanted to tell him he hadn’t really gotten it right. Not entirely. She wasn’t dressing as a guy- was she? Maybe. At this stage she wasn’t quite sure who she was or much of what she was doing.

She settled for, “Don’t tell anyone what you saw this afternoon.”

Judai seemed to find some sort of humour in her statement. “When you ask someone for help, you should really explain why first.”

“I can’t!” She couldn’t tell the story- it was too long, too embarrassing, too personal.

“Then let’s duel!”

“What? Why?” A fair question considering the circumstance.

“No one can lie in a duel.” Just reinforcing Rei’s view on his foolishness, but there was something intriguing about his philosophy even so.

“So you’ll keep quiet if I win?”

“Sure.”

It seemed like the easy way out- Professor Daitokuji had said it earlier, that she was capable of being in Ra with her grades and Judai, who scored low on even his initial entry, was up against her. She’d win this. Seemed that way too for the majority of the duel.

It was her most trusty deck- her Maiden in Love. The one she put the most of her time and effort into, the one she wanted to show most to her beloved Ryo, should she now get the chance to confess.

It had all been going so well until it hadn’t and then before she knew it the duel was out of her hands and she was sitting on the floor, done. But she wasn’t one to go back on a promise; she’d state her reasons for being on the island even if she hadn’t wanted to.

“Judai, I-”

“Hold up! Why don’t you tell the guy who’s been watching from behind this whole time?” Judai interrupted, gesturing over Rei’s shoulder to where she saw Ryo standing alongside a few others she couldn’t find herself focusing on.

“I was the one who snuck into your room this afternoon,” she admitted, pink staining her face, “Judai was just trying to stop me.”

“I know.” Of course he did.

“Ever since your first year, I’ve wanted to see you. I’ve wanted to be here and now that I am- I lost. I lost to Judai,” she sounded utterly miserable and paused for a moment before a sudden vigor returned, “but I don’t think I’ll lose my feelings for you! It’s not how I hoped it would go, but please accept the feelings of a- of a maiden!”

“Is he overwhelmed?” Judai asked, approaching as Ryo just stared and refused to say anything. “Ah! That was an amazing power, like those from the duel!”

“Your feelings are lovely,” the girl beside Ryo spoke, finally bringing her into Rei’s world, “but real love isn’t won with hugs and kisses like in your duel.”

“Oi! You’re not my rival or anything are you?”

The girl leaned back a bit and covered a smile with a laugh. “No, nothing like that!”

It was then that, finally, she heard Ryo speak again, fizzling the world around so that those there were only background.

“Rei, I’m flattered by your feelings but right now I’ve devoted myself to my dueling,” her hopeful face wilted as he spoke, not noticing as he made movement as he dug something out from his jacket pocket, attention coming back as his hand touched hers and left it tingling, leaving her hair pin in its place. “Go back to your hometown.”

  
“Why’s she have to go all the way back home?” Judai argued, “just because she snuck in as a boy-”

“Rei can’t stay here.”

“Is she hiding another secret? If she snuck in as a girl dressed as a boy then is she maybe actually a boy?” Rei wished she knew the answer to that question too. No one would tell her the answer so she’d sat on her weird place on the fence.

“She’s only in fifth grade.”

“What?! I was almost beat by a fifth grader?”

Rei chuckled. That response was almost worth it- Duel Monsters was always targeted at kids anyway.

“Gotcha!” she mocked with utmost sincerity.

The rest of the night was oddly fun even if it started and ended in her being recognised for her secret.

For a short while after the duel they sat outside and talked, even while they got colder by the second.

“Hey, would you guys say I’m a girl?” she asked suddenly, just as they were about to split and go back to each of their dorms.

“Sure.”

“Yeah.”

“Yup.”

“Yeah, why? Are you not?”

“Oh, no reason. I was just curious to how you guys saw me after all.”

She wasn’t sure why she spoke so loudly the next morning while her parents stood there, watching, not knowing her conflict in any of its forms, waving from the boat.

“Wait for me, my Judai! I’ll be back!”

 

* * *

 

She wished, then on, that the conflict between her body and mind could be just as easily solved as the whole fiasco then, but even she didn’t truly understand herself. She found something for herself, though. She certainly wasn’t a boy and gender was a social construct so who was it to care what she was to wear or call herself as long as she felt it suited her?

Less it bothered her than it did other people.

Coming back from Duel Academia had lit many fires. Perhaps too many. Her parents were beyond furious that she’d went off and done something so dangerous, not to mention they had heard her yell her goodbyes. ‘My Judai’, she’d said. How else could it be perceived other than romantic? She wasn’t allowed to see Yuri again, or so they claimed at the height of the scolding. She’d come clean about her participation in the plan though Rei doubted it’d be as harsh as her own punishment- an essay on why she shouldn’t go behind her parents back like such and no Duel Monsters for two months to top it all off.

She thought about it so much, though. She hadn’t much to do other than think after all. She thought about the academy and the people she’d met in her disappointingly short time there. She thought more about the question she asked them and their responses.

She was perceived as a girl, that much was evident. She’d come to recognise that much at least. She sometimes wore dresses while she was at Yuri’s, and they were pretty no doubt but they didn’t feel like her thing. She might wear one, if the occasion arose, but she was fine with what she had. Did that make her no longer a girl? The fact that she might not wear dresses all the time?

Being called a girl though made her happy. It felt right when everything else was wrong and if gender was a social construct was that it? Was that really all it took? Maybe she was too young to be thinking about this. Maybe she’d change when she was older even as it became more clear as she thought about it. She knew the bodily differences between boys and girls- they’d had their puberty talks- and both scared her. She didn’t want either changes to happen, she just wanted to stay her as she knew herself.

It was then that she said it, out loud, the phrase ‘I am a girl’ and the power she felt consumed her mind and body. The next feeling was that of dread as she caught movement from the corner of her eye and faced her mother, laundry basket on hip, eyes wide as saucers.

It wasn’t a fun conversation, no one would expect it to be. Her mother had called out to her dad, distressed, and they’d all gathered in the kitchen. Dour would be one way to express the mood.

Her dad, apparently, had thought something was up long ago, back when she first decided to grow her hair out. Her mum just thought she was perhaps confused- her mum always thinks she’s confused. It ended with her mum deciding she was too young to know what she wanted and her dad just watching as his wife left from his field of view.

“Do you want to change your name then?” her dad sprung after a lingering silence.

“What’s wrong with my name?”

“I have a co-worker,” he began, “his daughter was born a boy too but she uses a different name.”

She thought about it, well and truly, even if the time it took didn’t seem like it took very long.

“No, I like my name. Maybe I’ll change my mind, but I like it now.”

“Alright.” And her dad got up, shooing her back to her room to linger in the aftermath of the conversation as he went off to find wherever his wife had gotten off to.

 

* * *

 

 

Duel Academia was much different when she officially joined but it felt like home, like a place she could be herself.

No one officially knew her and aside from her current status as an Osiris she had pride in her ability as a duelist- she was sure she was better than many duelists in first year Ra at the very least!

A new place for a new her, she said. It hadn’t been that long since she’d come out to her parents and for all her mother’s questions she still felt as she had on that day- confused but still a girl. Part of her thought maybe she was carrying a charade just to spite her mother even though she knew it to be false.

Time away helped. Time with people who hadn’t known her before she was her, mainly. She found herself, so to speak, in that awful first year. She could be the Rei she wanted to be without a second glance.

It wasn’t the end of her journey, she knew. Things were rarely that easy and she’d probably tell someone eventually at some point- someone she trusted, someone that wouldn’t care either way (though half of her friends she was sure only saw duelling and nothing beyond). But a journey is meant to be walked on and sure, decidedly, she saw some of her other classmates spending their youth much more carefree but time catches up on everyone. That was why she decided something that made no sense in reality, though sure was fun to think about.

Her youth has been spent in constant states of turmoil, pain and anxiety and you can only ever go up from the bottom of a hill.

**Author's Note:**

> If it feels a bit rushed at some points that's probably because it is? A bit? I'm at summer school for uni and it's twenty past eleven and I'm sore and tired. I wanted to have this up before pride month was over so I'm sorry- I also found it hard to find reliable resources for how to write a trans character when you're also trans but trying to depict like the opposite from who you are so that made it a lot more difficult. 
> 
> Edit: I edited the story so it's got a different ending cause when I wrote the ending it was, as stated, half eleven and I woke up and found myself not liking it. It's so hard to end a story like this so I commend anyone who does it commonly. The largest thing that changed is that Rei is more explicitly a trans girl than before. 
> 
> If you made it through this long read thank you very much I appreciate it deeply. 
> 
> The title comes from the song 'The Young and the Restless' by Tide Lines. Alternative title would be 'Rising Moon' since the moon's supposed to represent femininity- that title is also based on the song 'The Rising Moon' by Tide Lines so go check those out. 
> 
> I didn't add a Rei/Ryo or Rei/Judai tag since they're not actual relationships. Also also, there's mention of grades and stuff in here and I'm Scottish so I don't Get That Shit so if you see something that makes you think 'hold on a minute' then tell me so I can fix it. Same rule applies to any trans folk out there who see something really glaring I'm missing in my tiredness.
> 
> Find me on Tumblr at [future-circuit!](http://future-circuit.tumblr.com/)


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